How much jail time for women who've had abortions?
SuzannePjam
Posts: 411
Interesting article. I would have thought that many of the pro-lifers interviewed would have wanted the women to rot in jail for having an abortion, but that was not the case. Some only wanted the physician persecuted, which I find odd. There was an interesting question regarding this posed: Is the message that women are not to be held responsible for their actions? Or is it merely that those writing the laws understand that if women were going to jail, the vast majority of Americans would violently object?
How Much Jail Time?
By Anna Quindlen
Newsweek
Aug. 6, 2007 issue - Buried among prairie dogs and amateur animation shorts on YouTube is a curious little mini-documentary shot in front of an abortion clinic in Libertyville, Ill. The man behind the camera is asking demonstrators who want abortion criminalized what the penalty should be for a woman who has one nonetheless. You have rarely seen people look more gobsmacked. It's as though the guy has asked them to solve quadratic equations. Here are a range of responses: "I've never really thought about it." "I don't have an answer for that." "I don't know." "Just pray for them."
You have to hand it to the questioner; he struggles manfully. "Usually when things are illegal there's a penalty attached," he explains patiently. But he can't get a single person to be decisive about the crux of a matter they have been approaching with absolute certainty.
A new public-policy group called the National Institute for Reproductive Health wants to take this contradiction and make it the centerpiece of a national conversation, along with a slogan that stops people in their tracks: how much time should she do? If the Supreme Court decides abortion is not protected by a constitutional guarantee of privacy, the issue will revert to the states. If it goes to the states, some, perhaps many, will ban abortion. If abortion is made a crime, then surely the woman who has one is a criminal. But, boy, do the doctrinaire suddenly turn squirrelly at the prospect of throwing women in jail.
"They never connect the dots," says Jill June, president of Planned Parenthood of Greater Iowa. But her organization urged voters to do just that in the last gubernatorial election, in which the Republican contender believed abortion should be illegal even in cases of rape and incest. "We wanted him to tell the women of Iowa exactly how much time he expected them to serve in jail if they had an abortion," June recalled. Chet Culver, the Democrat who unabashedly favors legal abortion, won that race, proving that choice can be a winning issue if you force people to stop evading the hard facts. "How have we come this far in the debate and been oblivious to the logical ramifications of making abortion illegal?" June says.
Perhaps by ignoring or infantilizing women, turning them into "victims" of their own free will. State statutes that propose punishing only a physician suggest the woman was merely some addled bystander who happened to find herself in the wrong stirrups at the wrong time. Such a view seemed to be a vestige of the past until the Supreme Court handed down its most recent abortion decision upholding a federal prohibition on a specific procedure. Justice Anthony Kennedy, obviously feeling excessively paternal, argued that the ban protected women from themselves. "While we find no reliable data to measure the phenomenon," he wrote, "it seems unexceptionable to conclude some women come to regret their choice to abort the infant life they once created and sustained."
Even with "no reliable data," he went on to conclude that "severe depression and loss of esteem can follow." (Apparently, no one has told Justice Kennedy about the severe depression and loss of esteem that can follow bearing and raising a baby you can't afford and didn't want.) Luckily, there still remains one justice on the court who has actually been pregnant, and Ruth Bader Ginsburg roared back with a dissent that called Kennedy's caveat about regret an "anti-abortion shibboleth" and his opinion a reflection of "ancient notions about women's place in the family and under the Constitution—ideas that have long since been discredited."
Those ancient notions undergird the refusal to confront the logical endpoint of criminalization. Lawmakers in a number of states have already passed or are considering statutes designed to outlaw abortion if Roe is overturned. But almost none hold the woman, the person who set the so-called crime in motion, accountable. Is the message that women are not to be held responsible for their actions? Or is it merely that those writing the laws understand that if women were going to jail, the vast majority of Americans would violently object? Watch the demonstrators in Libertyville try to worm their way out of the hypocrisy: It's murder, but she'll get her punishment from God. It's murder, but it depends on her state of mind. It's murder, but the penalty should be ... counseling?
The great thing about video is that you can see the mental wheels turning as these people realize that they somehow have overlooked something central while they were slinging certainties. Nearly 20 years ago, in a presidential debate, George Bush the elder was asked this very question, whether in making abortion illegal he would punish the woman who had one. "I haven't sorted out the penalties," he said lamely. Neither, it turns out, has anyone else. But there are only two logical choices: hold women accountable for a criminal act by sending them to prison, or refuse to criminalize the act in the first place. If you can't countenance the first, you have to accept the second. You can't have it both ways.
How Much Jail Time?
By Anna Quindlen
Newsweek
Aug. 6, 2007 issue - Buried among prairie dogs and amateur animation shorts on YouTube is a curious little mini-documentary shot in front of an abortion clinic in Libertyville, Ill. The man behind the camera is asking demonstrators who want abortion criminalized what the penalty should be for a woman who has one nonetheless. You have rarely seen people look more gobsmacked. It's as though the guy has asked them to solve quadratic equations. Here are a range of responses: "I've never really thought about it." "I don't have an answer for that." "I don't know." "Just pray for them."
You have to hand it to the questioner; he struggles manfully. "Usually when things are illegal there's a penalty attached," he explains patiently. But he can't get a single person to be decisive about the crux of a matter they have been approaching with absolute certainty.
A new public-policy group called the National Institute for Reproductive Health wants to take this contradiction and make it the centerpiece of a national conversation, along with a slogan that stops people in their tracks: how much time should she do? If the Supreme Court decides abortion is not protected by a constitutional guarantee of privacy, the issue will revert to the states. If it goes to the states, some, perhaps many, will ban abortion. If abortion is made a crime, then surely the woman who has one is a criminal. But, boy, do the doctrinaire suddenly turn squirrelly at the prospect of throwing women in jail.
"They never connect the dots," says Jill June, president of Planned Parenthood of Greater Iowa. But her organization urged voters to do just that in the last gubernatorial election, in which the Republican contender believed abortion should be illegal even in cases of rape and incest. "We wanted him to tell the women of Iowa exactly how much time he expected them to serve in jail if they had an abortion," June recalled. Chet Culver, the Democrat who unabashedly favors legal abortion, won that race, proving that choice can be a winning issue if you force people to stop evading the hard facts. "How have we come this far in the debate and been oblivious to the logical ramifications of making abortion illegal?" June says.
Perhaps by ignoring or infantilizing women, turning them into "victims" of their own free will. State statutes that propose punishing only a physician suggest the woman was merely some addled bystander who happened to find herself in the wrong stirrups at the wrong time. Such a view seemed to be a vestige of the past until the Supreme Court handed down its most recent abortion decision upholding a federal prohibition on a specific procedure. Justice Anthony Kennedy, obviously feeling excessively paternal, argued that the ban protected women from themselves. "While we find no reliable data to measure the phenomenon," he wrote, "it seems unexceptionable to conclude some women come to regret their choice to abort the infant life they once created and sustained."
Even with "no reliable data," he went on to conclude that "severe depression and loss of esteem can follow." (Apparently, no one has told Justice Kennedy about the severe depression and loss of esteem that can follow bearing and raising a baby you can't afford and didn't want.) Luckily, there still remains one justice on the court who has actually been pregnant, and Ruth Bader Ginsburg roared back with a dissent that called Kennedy's caveat about regret an "anti-abortion shibboleth" and his opinion a reflection of "ancient notions about women's place in the family and under the Constitution—ideas that have long since been discredited."
Those ancient notions undergird the refusal to confront the logical endpoint of criminalization. Lawmakers in a number of states have already passed or are considering statutes designed to outlaw abortion if Roe is overturned. But almost none hold the woman, the person who set the so-called crime in motion, accountable. Is the message that women are not to be held responsible for their actions? Or is it merely that those writing the laws understand that if women were going to jail, the vast majority of Americans would violently object? Watch the demonstrators in Libertyville try to worm their way out of the hypocrisy: It's murder, but she'll get her punishment from God. It's murder, but it depends on her state of mind. It's murder, but the penalty should be ... counseling?
The great thing about video is that you can see the mental wheels turning as these people realize that they somehow have overlooked something central while they were slinging certainties. Nearly 20 years ago, in a presidential debate, George Bush the elder was asked this very question, whether in making abortion illegal he would punish the woman who had one. "I haven't sorted out the penalties," he said lamely. Neither, it turns out, has anyone else. But there are only two logical choices: hold women accountable for a criminal act by sending them to prison, or refuse to criminalize the act in the first place. If you can't countenance the first, you have to accept the second. You can't have it both ways.
"Where there is sacrifice there is someone collecting the sacrificial offerings."-- Ayn Rand
"Some of my friends sit around every evening and they worry about the times ahead,
But everybody else is overwhelmed by indifference and the promise of an early bed..."-- Elvis Costello
"Some of my friends sit around every evening and they worry about the times ahead,
But everybody else is overwhelmed by indifference and the promise of an early bed..."-- Elvis Costello
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Whatever a woman gets for killing her born child, that's what she should get for killing her unborn child.
-Enoch Powell
i wish more pro-lifers would publicly share your certainty. the right wing christian movement would die at the polls so fast we might be able to get this country back on track and talking about real issues.
but i agree. if the central tenet of the pro-lifers is that the fetus is a living human baby, the woman having an abortion should be charged with pre-meditated murder at least. nothing else makes sense.
At the same time, right wing Christians are more than willing to adopt babies that are in danger of abortion. They put their money where their mouths are.
-Enoch Powell
last i checked, there were a hell of a lot of kids in fucked up foster care systems waiting to be adopted. so it looks like y'all have a bit more work to do then.
has your family adopted a baby?
I was referring to Christian groups run by James Dobson and Pat Robertson.
We haven't adopted but we haven't aborted either!
-Enoch Powell
I'm not buying that... There are some families (both religious and not) that go out of their way to adopt and take care of neglected children, but for the most part, people don't.
Think of all of the people who you personally know.... through school, work, church, etc... and I'd be amazed if you can think of more than a few who have adopted kids... and out of those, I would just about bet they all adopted because of fertility issues or inability to have kids... not because there were unwanted kids out there.
Also, adoption in this country is a very long, difficult, and heartbreaking thing to go through. Especially if trying to get a baby.
was like a picture
of a sunny day
“We can complain because rose bushes have thorns, or rejoice because thorn bushes have roses.”
― Abraham Lincoln
Christian families adopt in far greater numbers than non-Christian.
-Enoch Powell
and they've still got a lot of work to do. cos last i checked people were still fucking, still having abortions, and there were still a lot of unwanted babies with no homes out there.
i havent aborted anyone either. most pro-choice people havent.
Are you talking total numbers? 3/4 of people in this country say they are christian, so of course they would adopt more children based on numbers alone.
I would guess that adoptions run along income lines as well, with rich people adoption (and being approved more as adoptive parents) than poor.
was like a picture
of a sunny day
“We can complain because rose bushes have thorns, or rejoice because thorn bushes have roses.”
― Abraham Lincoln
Also Christians adopt at a higher rate than non-Christians.
-Enoch Powell
what has this got to do with anything? fact remains, if the pro-life movement TRULY put its money where it's mouth is and started calling for laws that would give women life in prison for premeditated murder if they got an abortion, they would get the shit kicked out of them in every single election from here to judgment day. but they wont, cos they dont have the balls and their beliefs will only go so far as their preachers believe is politically expedient.
"Obama's main opponent in this election on November 4th (was) not John McCain, it (was) ignorance."~Michael Moore
"i'm feeling kinda righteous right now. with my badass motherfuckin' ukulele!"
~ed, 8/7
Just saying: the way to reduce abortion is to increase adoption. Everyone agrees on this. At least Christians are actually trying to do other positive things besides just banning abortion (which should also be done).
-Enoch Powell
Do you think single mothers are never sent to prison ever? Should we just never send them to prison because they have kids?
We have ways of dealing with that and it's called foster care. That's why you don't commit a crime when you're a parent. It screws your kids over.
-Enoch Powell
ill agree with that. i've always said id rather see abortion unnecessary than illegal and if the pro-life movement can come up with a system that ensures that every baby born will be taken care of, then im willing to start listening.
...are those who've helped us.
Right 'round the corner could be bigger than ourselves.
You are so full of it. LOL.
Freedom is Slavery
Ignorance is Strength
America definitely identifies more with my conservatism than your liberal pinko b.s.
-Enoch Powell
And that's why abortion is legal and we never see any large scale protests against it, I guess.
Man is least himself when he talks in his own person. Give him a mask, and he will tell you the truth.
-Oscar Wilde
The, um - ahem - "sad" fact is, the country has been getting more and more socially liberal since its inception. And, looking at the major party candidates on both sides - a bit more fiscally liberal as well.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/March_for_Life
"The first March for Life was held on the West Steps of the Capitol, with an estimated 20,000 supporters in attendance. [1] In recent years the number of marchers has been estimated at around 100,000 to 300,000 each year,[citation needed] considered the most attended annual march in Washington D.C.[2]"
Pwned!
-Enoch Powell
That is pretty big, true enough. But you see protests against the war in every large city and much more frequently with each passing year...when the majority of people are against something you'll see it everywhere...and no, I don't mean a few people gathered at the local clinics.
Man is least himself when he talks in his own person. Give him a mask, and he will tell you the truth.
-Oscar Wilde
Man is least himself when he talks in his own person. Give him a mask, and he will tell you the truth.
-Oscar Wilde
In my opinion, protesting doesn't indicate public opinion at all. It attracts the most intense advocates of that position.
March for Life people are generally pretty humble and tranquil during the March for Life, mainly because the thing they're protesting is so sobering. 40 million babies isn't something you get into a frenzy over.
-Enoch Powell
That doesn't make any sense.
Man is least himself when he talks in his own person. Give him a mask, and he will tell you the truth.
-Oscar Wilde
yeah, those people arent the most intense advocates by ANY stretch. i could round up 300,000 people once a year to march on dc over pollution easily too... the difference being the pinko liberals know when they're not gonna win something.
You couldn't get 300,000 people annually. I guarantee it. Liberals are lazy, stupid, and ugly. Haha, they need help wiping their own asses.
All kidding aside, "winning" does not make a difference. You protest abortion to simply indicate that, "Yes, we're opposed to the Roe v. Wade decision and we're still here in 2007." Pro-Life people don't seem to be going away for some reason. The decision was made in 1973. And we're still here.
-Enoch Powell